Uploaded January 2025 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago

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Modern LEGO parts come in thousands of shapes and hundreds of colors, but in the far-away days of 1966 there was not as much variety to choose from. That didn't stop some clever folks at LEGO from coming up with a plethora of designs for the company to showcase in their Idea Books. In most cases, these models had no detailed building instructions, only some general guidance on how to approach a structure that would at least be similar to what was shown on the pages.

Today, Nathan tackles a ship from a harbor scene about halfway through an Idea Book that came out in 1966. You can find step-by-step instructions to build this model on Rebrickable here: https://reb.li/m/198438

0:00 LEGO Idea Books
1:37 Harbor Scene
2:30 Model & Speedbuild
5:17 Build Notes
10:14 Conclusions

Idea Book 239 review by BrickTsar youtube.com/watch?v=UitJBBNZisM
Brickset Idea Book Scans brickset.com/library/ideasbooks
239 Rebrickable Catalogue entry rebrickable.com/sets/239-1/wir-bauen-mit-lego-idea-book/?inventory=1
Scanned PDF of 239 oldinstructions.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/1966-239-1-Idea-Book.pdf

Music: "Lights" by Patrick Patrikios, sourced from the YouTube Audio Library